Thursday, January 26, 2017

An article published in BMC Psychiatry this week shows that zinc supplements could increase the effectiveness of stimulants used to treat children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

"The effects of ADHD on individual children differ, but symptoms include inattention, hyperactivity and impulsiveness. Stimulants are the most common treatment prescribed, but recent findings that vitamin and mineral deficiencies correlate with ADHD suggest that dietary supplements could also play a role in disease management.

Researchers from Iran carried out a controlled trial to assess the benefits of prescribing supplementary zinc alongside the more conventional methylphenidate treatment. They found that children taking additional zinc sulphate on a daily basis improved faster than those taking a placebo.

"The efficacy of zinc sulphate to increase the rate of improvement in children, seems to support the role of zinc deficiency in the pathogenesis of ADHD," say the authors."